


wilted bluebells, cheap scissors

by strideordie



Category: Over the Garden Wall (Cartoon)
Genre: Anxiety, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Hallucinations Mention, Moving On, Panic Attacks, even tho it beenn like 3 year, just once tho, kinda angsty be warned, the ending is sweet tho :0, wirts still a sad boi abt the unknown
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-12
Updated: 2016-12-12
Packaged: 2018-09-08 03:27:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8828602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strideordie/pseuds/strideordie
Summary: Before leaving his hometown for good, Wirt says his goodbyes to an old friend.





	

**Author's Note:**

> ok so its 4 am i got otgw feelings outta NOWHERE so heres this its been my favorite series for like 3 years and ive never written anything for it 
> 
> listen to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGnf8TMlYi0 this if you need some mood music! its what inspired this fic :0

The autumn wind blew through Wirt’s hair, his bangs dancing in it for mere seconds before falling into his eyes. He stuffed his hands further into his pockets, fingers curling around the cold metal object inside his right. It was unsettlingly cold for a mid August day, the grey sky emerging from the foggy background in an almost eerie manner, which satisfied Wirt’s poetic need for the tone of this outing to be serious. His eyes laid on the stone in front of him, a simple rectangular shape, the edges worn from weather and the stone itself covered in spider-like cracks, but the engraving could be read all the same. _Beatrice Crauford, Beloved Daughter, 1804-1820._ She wouldn’t have liked it, Wirt thought, almost smirking at the mental image of Bea being upset at the blandness of her own grave.

 

It wasn’t the first time Wirt had seen it, though for a while after they came back they would never even go near the graveyard. Even when he started driving he subconsciously avoided that street, that whole part of town, really. No one else noticed, at least Sara never did when he would drive her to school junior year, but when it was just him and Greg, Wirt knew he could tell. Greg was smart for his age, he always had been, although Wirt doubted he would want to see it either. He would think about doing little things, like passing it on the way to the grocery store, to ease himself in, to just _get over_ whatever kind of irrational fear he had of it, but that night the nightmares would come back and he would decide just to keep avoiding it. 

 

It took him to senior year to open up to Sara about it, as if he expected anything but understanding and support from her, and by the end of fall semester he could go on walks through it with her without seeing train fog lights or feeling water in his lungs. Through their nearing 3 year relationship, Sara subsided all of her curious instincts to be patient and gentle with him, especially about what happened halloween night of their sophomore year. She didn’t comment when he would flinch at the sound of a twig snapping, or when they had to interrupt movie nights to pick up Greg from a sleepover because he woke up crying, saying he needed to see his brother. Hell, she would even drive at whatever ungodly hour just so Wirt could sit in the back seat with Greg and calm him down.

 

Even when she first tried to take him into the cemetery again for the first time, per his request, and he started panicking, stumbling over his hoarse words booming that _I knew these people, oh god I knew these people they’ve been dead for centuries I could’ve ended up here too we both could’ve oh my god_ she didn’t call him crazy, instead held him until his breathing slowed again and he could see it go in and out in the cold air, saying how she might not understand, and she might not ever understand but she was here for him all the same, and that he was safe, and that he just had to think about his breathing and it would all go away. He still felt like he didn’t deserve her, some loud irrational part of his brain constantly screaming that she didn’t ask for all of this, he’s too much of a burden for her, and he tried his best to ignore that voice, as Sara constantly reminds him that _yes_ she’s staying with him out of her own free will and not out of pity and _no_ you’re not a burden, Wirt, where did you ever get that idea and _yes_ this is dumb, I love you and nothing could change that, her voice sweet and smooth like honey and brown sugar. Greg’s dad- _his_ dad helped him make her a mix for their second year anniversary, deciding that she needed a real tape with real songs and not just him playing shitty clarinet like the ones he gave to her all the time. She teased that she was greatly disappointed her anniversary tape didn’t feature any of the usual haikus about her in her bee costume or experimental jazz pieces. She still kept every last one of those tapes, stacked neatly onto a shelf above her bed, organized by date, despite how much Wirt complained over how embarrassing they were whenever he was over. 

 

He had never mentioned Bea to her, he doesn’t know why. If he brought it up right he wouldn’t sound totally insane, calling her a childhood friend he drifted apart from or something like that just so he could talk to _someone_ about Bea, her annoying laugh or the tone she used when she was impatient that perfectly signaled how discontent she was. He worried that somehow if he just kept these little memories he still had to himself they would fade away someday, and he couldn’t let that happen. He had to remember her--all of her. If that meant always carrying some kind of memory of his time in The Unknown with him for the rest of his life, so be it. He owed her that much. When he first came across her grave, curiousness overcame him and he looked up her family’s name in City Hall. All he found was documents stating they owned a house where a boarded up pharmacy now stands and the death certificates of all of them, date of death all the same. He could’ve looked further, found out what happened to them, but he stopped himself. It felt like he was reading an old friend’s diary in the most morbid way possible. He wanted to remember her for how she was in the fucked up afterlife, not how she lived, as backwards as that was, and he had the comfort of knowing they were all human again, together, and Bea didn’t have to ever step foot into the woods again if she didn’t want to, spending the rest of eternity with the family she fought so hard to get back. 

 

He found the bird scissors at a fucking Michaels of all places, picking up supplies for a junior year physics project on a sticky spring evening. That was the year everything felt wrong, the first year he was older than Bea, the first year she felt more far away than ever. He hesitated for a second, knowing he didn’t have to buy them, it wouldn’t matter, it wasn’t like they were the magic ones or something, they were just decorative cheaply made scissors Wirt, for god’s sake, but he gave his conscious the bird and fumbled them off their stand, proudly handing the cashier his crumpled ten for that and some painters tape. It felt like he was almost making an inside joke with her, except kind of depressing if he thought about it too hard. _Look at me now, Bea, a seventeen year old living breathing human being who still can’t get over a friend he made in purgatory and/or a hallucination once when I was fifteen, ironically buying hex breaking scissors, marvel at how well adjusted I am._ He tightly held onto them in his pocket, walking inside his messy room, jamming them into his desk supplies drawer and not looking at them again for another year. 

 

He took them out of his pocket now, holding them to eye level, inspecting the already cracking gold paint and smiling a little to himself about how stupid this all was. You can’t say goodbye to a person who’s already been dead for a hundred years, Wirt, she can’t actually see any of this. It still gleamed in the gloomy light when he moved it a little, though, just like the scissors did in The Unknown if he held them right. This was his last stop before the drive to New York, and Sara didn’t ask any questions when he requested it, letting him know that he could take as much time as he needed. He kneeled by her grave, an awkward, stiff motion but a necessary one, gently placing the scissors in the remains of the bluebells he left by her graveside just a month ago for her birthday, his cold fingers turning a wilted petal to pieces as he touched it. He whispered a quiet “goodbye, Bea,” before he let go of the cold metal, hand hovering over it and then going back into his pocket, standing up to admire the peaceful picture. There were flowers growing on the sides of her headstone, little gerber daisies peaking out of the frosted over grass, the wind bending them all kinds of ways. The silence was different, now, not lonely. Welcomed. For the first time in three years, he felt at peace.

 

“Wirt,” a voice called from the fog to his right, “You ready to go?”

 

It was five in the morning and miserable outside and god was she still beautiful, her deep brown curls finding their way out of her yellow knitted hat, like ivy growing up the white columns of a deserted pantheon, the flakes of gold in her otherwise deep, nearly black eyes that somehow caught the light even when there was none. He could see her breath even from all the way down the path it was so cold, her cheeks and nose pinched with a deep red glow, her lips a little cracked but still in a smile. For an astronomy student she truly belonged among stars, and Wirt was going to be with her every step of the way. Just a couple of hours ago he was still kept awake with guilt, feeling like he was abandoning Bea in this miserable town, like he was throwing his closest friend out and replacing her with a new, shinier city, like how _dare_ he move on. He looks back down at the grave, and then at Sara, _his_ Sara, and hesitates for a split second before feeling a cold, phantom hand from behind him push him into the first step towards her down the cemetery path. 

 

“Yeah, I’m ready.”

**Author's Note:**

> i hope yall liked it!! if i fucked up some canon shoot me a comment n ill fix it, thank you so much for taking the time to read this ah man :00


End file.
